Friday, June 21, 2013

Rare sighting

All photos by Hazlitt 6/11/2013

Matt and Ellen 'ran' into two couples standing around this (Sonoran) Coral Snake on 6/11/2013. Matt asked the photographer to send me photos for the blog, and he obliged. Thank you, mysterious visitor! Coral snakes are very rarely seen, usually active at night. In the same family as cobras.
This is a full-grown Coral Snake. They're only about 1.5 ft long and about as big around as my little finger. Yes, they are venomous and their bite is very dangerous, but they can't really get their mouth around much of you. You are wise to keep your distance anyway. You don't want to be the first recorded death in Arizona.
The rhyme is all about what color the red is touching. Red on yellow, kill a fellow. Red on black, venom lack. (Yellow is the same as white in these cases. Just doesn't rhyme as nicely with fellow.)